2 COLONIAL AND POST-COLONIAL DEVELOPMENTS
IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OF BANANA PRODUCTION ............ 16
Endnotes ............................................ 45

3 MARKETS, TRANSNATIONALS AND THE STATE:
SECURING THE PLACE OF ST. LUCIAN BANANAS IN
THE UNITED KINGDOM ...................................... 46
E ndnotes .............................................. 70

Despite these various ways of integrating the globe, most authors underscore the

paradox that the world is becoming anything but homogenized (Appadurai 1990;

Hannerz 1992). Even though people may have a "sense that the world is a single place"

(Featherstone 1993:171), experience in the new global economy is characterized by

"disjunctures" (Appadurai 1990) or irregularity, rather than ubiquitous and unproblematic

economic, cultural and political fusion. Thus, global forces do not simply overrun the

communities and nations where they enter, but rather they give rise to and/or negotiate

local distinctions.

This is the cultural basis of globalization. The dynamics of integration and the

reorganization of activities often challenge cultural practices in a given location and lead

people to assert a distinctive identity. In the assertion of a local identity, people recreate

global forces as local phenomena as they resist integration on home terrain. Put another

way, people transform global dynamics into local property and projects and use them as

expressions of local identity. As Stuart Hall sees it:

It is a respect for local roots which is brought to bear against the anonymous,
impersonal world of the globalized forces which we do not understand. "I cannot
speak of the world but I can speak of my community" The face-to-face
communities that are knowable, that are locatable, one can give them place. (Hall
1990:35)

Thus, often in acts of protest against the crafty intrusion of globalization, people wrestle

with integration processes at home rather than within an amorphous global field.

Framework for the Dissertation

This dissertation is about the problematic in economy, culture and politics that

emerge with the way in which St. Lucia's banana industry is becoming further integrated

into the liberalizing market of the European Community. It is about the way that

international and national political and economic dimensions structure the activities of

people who produce for an integrating market, how these dimensions intersect with

cultural patterns of work among St. Lucian banana growers, and how they prompt

collective response as a cultural and national project. My argument is that the flexible

production patterns that are part and parcel of today's global economic strategy render the

activities of individual, contracting farmers more risky because these producers bear

more of the costs of production. At the same time, flexible production undermines their

control over the way in which production is organized. The appearance of independence

and autonomy of production is a facade that masks new forms of exploitation.

Transnational corporations linking producers to the European market are largely

responsible for the way that production is organized and for rendering it more flexible

11

and dispersed. They hold a position of power to the extent that they mastermind much of

the international production process and often set it in motion via contracts. Because the

state (seeking to ensure the nation's place in the market) actively condones and backs

transnational practices within the nation, and because the local banana institutions direct

growers on how to work under flexible production, both the state and local organizations

appear to producers as the visible enforcers of new production practices. Thus, when

people confront globalization, they see it as a local phenomenon rather than one outside

of their purview. They confront it in the form of protest against problems of autonomy

and economic risk, but the economic basis of their organized struggles is displayed as

battles with local officials over government control and national identity.

Organization of Chapters and Methodology

My argument is laid out and concluded in the next six chapters. The history of

the St. Lucian banana industry is told in Chapter Two. In it, I present the way in which

the banana industry developed out of the sugar industry and metamorphosed from a

plantation structure to a smallholder driven activity. A central point made in this chapter

is that the industry has always been circumscribed within an international context, yet the

"external" actors influencing it have shifted from being colonial administrators to state

officials and transnationals. The activities of the latter two helped render the banana

industry more nationally entrenched than its predecessor industry. Eventually politics

became part of the dynamics of banana production as the ruling government

12

resisted the transition into bananas via various policies supporting sugar. At this point it

placed the government in opposition to the transnational's activities.

In Chapter Three I argue that by the 1970s the British transnational corporation

responsible for buying and shipping St. Lucian bananas intersected with the St. Lucian

state to construct the industry as increasingly global. I show how growers' control over

the organization of their banana production tasks was prevented by formal legislation

prescribing how, when and for whom "independent" banana growers had to cultivate

bananas, in order to achieve a product deemed globally competitive. Additionally, the

sugar prices dropped, St. Lucian planters, like those in other parts of the West Indies,

began leaving behind plantation life. Reporters of the 1897 commissioned inquiry

(United Kingdom 1897:116), for instance, noted that more than 30 estates had been

abandoned between the years 1887-1897.

Looking at the St. Lucian land registry in a later period, Meliczek (1975:8-9)

observed that, 216 planters gave up 44,000 acres of land to the Crown between 1890 and

1950. It was the more vulnerable smaller estates that tended to abandon production,

while the larger estates held on. The Roseau, Cul-de-Sac and Dennery estates remained

in operation for at least another decade while, during World War II, the Vieux Fort estate

was transformed into a temporary U.S. naval base.

A smallholder class was developing before European planters began giving up on

sugar, but the retreat of many planters helped to expedite its growth. Although, due to

unclear and insufficient data, indicators of a smallholder population are difficult to

discern definitively, Louis (1981) provides the closest evidence in his study of

Stipendiary Magistrates reports between 1845-1854. For him, the reports suggest that

immediately following emancipation there was an establishment of small scale,

independently-run farms. This is because they show an increase in the number of

freeholders over this nine year period. While there were 1,345 freeholders in 1845, six

years later the figure had almost doubled, exceeding 2,500, descending to 2,300 by 1853

(Louis 1981:57). Similarly, by 1897, the West Indies Commission noted that over 5,500

acres (600 of which were planted in sugar cane) were operated by approximately 70

small scale peasant proprietors (United Kingdom 1897:116)

To be sure, acquisition of land was one of the most significant means by which

African and African-descended peoples got their start as socially and economically

independent persons (Mintz 1989). In St. Lucia, land for production and residence was

acquired in at least four significant ways (listed in order of prevalence): squatting,

sharing land communally (known in the Caribbean as "family land" tenure),2

sharecropping (known in St. Lucia as "metayage"), and purchasing land (Meliczek 1975).

All forms of land tenure (with the possible exception of family land) involved some

degree of interaction with the large plantations. Even though the recently freed

population acquired means to produce for itself, it still intersected with larger estates in

temporary, part-time laboring, or tenancy arrangements.

For obvious reasons, it is difficult to assess the extent of squatting and family

land tenure forms.3 Family land has been well addressed in the St. Lucian literature.

However, its place in historical peasant development is a missing feature of most studies,

although its longstanding predominance in St. Lucia is not disputed (cf. Momsen 1972;

Bruce 1983; Barrow 1992; Crichlow 1993). The only reference to the basis of its history

is the French Civil Code, dating back to French colonial rule, which legally justifies

multiple inheritance rights for the kin of someone who dies intestate.

Other land tenure types include squatting and freehold. Acosta and Casimir

(1985) and Lewis (1936) suggest that just after slavery, squatting was the most prevalent

means of land use, especially on abandoned fertile lands or on unoccupied hillside tracts.

Purchasing abandoned land from the Crown, by contrast, appears to have been

uncommon among ex-slaves. Only 725 persons bought approximately 7900 acres out of

the more than 40,000 acres that had been relinquished to the British Crown (Meliczek

1975:9).

Metayage (or sharecropping) was another common practice and important feature

of the social landscape in St. Lucia's agriculture. Beginning in the mid 19th century, it

lasted almost a century during sugar's primacy. The tenant's responsibility was to grow

export crops (primarily sugar cane, coffee or cocoa) and to sell them to the planter-

landlord who kept a portion of the returns (Louis 1981). Metayers also could use the

land to plant other crops for their own use or sale, without any further obligation to the

owner. According to Louis (1981) ex-slaves preferred this arrangement because other

means of holding land were not available to them. Testimony to this is provided by the

fact that in 1841 some type of share arrangement existed on seventeen out of twenty-two

estates in one of the island's districts (Marshall 1965).

Nonetheless, almost a century later, the Royal Commission (United Kingdom

1930) documented a total of 900 metayers and "contributors"4 in St. Lucia compared

with 6,900 estate laborers. This meant that, despite an increase in metayage, wage work

absorbed more persons. Even in wage situations land frequently was made available to

laborers who were given small estate parcels for independent use (Shephard 1947).

When and how to allot land parcels to laborers was left up to planters, and it is possible

to infer, consequently, that working for wages as a means to gain access to land may

have been the least preferable arrangement for the non-European populace. This seems

so because the possibilities for independent production were set according to the

preferences of the planter whose foremost motivations for granting tenure were for the

transfer of labor .

Small holders (or peasants), semi-proletarians and proletarians, therefore, were

constrained because they worked in a setting where large scale agricultural production

predominated and where their activities had to be encompassed within the plantation

regime. More than a century after emancipation, ex-slaves and now ex-indentured

servants from India5 were attached to sugar production in myriad ways, but they also

were producing a variety of crops on their own fields, and became active and

independent participants in St. Lucia's agricultural economy.

Data from the 1946 Agricultural Census (see Tables 2.1 and 2.2) provide some

indicators of the size and nature of the smallholder population in St. Lucia. In this

period, a peasant class outnumbered large planters in St. Lucia, as shown by the sizeable

number of small farms under one acre (2,044) and between one and seven acres (1684),

in contrast to the number for those 10 acres (1211) or even over 100 acres (81).

Table 2.1

Farm Indicators for St. Lucia. 1946

No of farms under one acre 2,980
No of farms over one acre 2,044
No of farms between one
and seven acres 1,684
Total No of farms 5,024
Area of land in farm 66,127
No of farm operators: 2,980
owner-cultivators 2,391
tenant-cultivators: 96
rent for cash 45
rent-free 7
share of crops 42
tenant terms unstated 2
No of hired workers 2,658
No. of family workers 7,606

on small plots (Table 2.2).6 However, this does not preclude the existence of export

crops on small farms. Indeed, two crops typically grown for export during this period,

cocoa and coconuts, were found on small and large farms and appear to have been most

common on medium range farms between five and twenty acres. Banana production,

also was more prevalent among the medium farming group and, as we will see in the

next section, bananas were grown for international sale by 1946. Thus, operators on

small parcels were indeed represented in the production of export crops as well as non-

export crops.

The 1946 census data do not reveal combinations of agricultural activities such as

those farms carrying out own-account production while engaging in wage labor. The

widely diffused throughout St. Lucian society. It was international market competition

that displaced St. Lucia from the sugar race and that created the possibilities for bananas

to be sugar's successor. But with this possibility came new policies, and new

institutional and political actors, all of which affixed banana production in St. Lucia in

such a way that it extended beyond the boundaries of the farm field. They also came

together to structure a national banana industry. Although the introduction of Geest

Industries initially began as one of conflict with the state, the company's role seemingly

narrowed and unproblematized the distance between European markets and St. Lucia

farm fields by taking both local production and foreign distribution under its wing.

Notes

1.According to Mintz (1989) a reconstituted peasantry refers to a peasant population that
emerged after emancipation, but that had already been in the making under slavery.

2.Although colonial documents in the 1940s referred to Family Land as an obstacle to
"efficient" farming, there are insufficient data suggesting the period during which this
tenure form emerged, or assessing its scale in St. Lucia prior to the 1970s.

3.Family land, described in more detail in Chapter Five, is a communal form of land
tenure based on family inheritance rights.

4.Contributors were producers who worked on freehold or leased land and who sold cut
canes to the plantations for processing into sugar by-products.

5. As in other parts of the West Indies, Indians from East Asia were brought to St. Lucia
as indentured servants at the end of the 19th century, to make up for the loss of slave
labor and the withdrawal of the emancipated population from estate work.

6.The census data do not provide information on cropping patterns for farms under one
acre, despite the remarkable proportion of farms in this category.

7.The St. Lucia Labour Party is the same party which had held power in the 1950s. It
lost its primacy to the conservative United Workers Party with the 1964 elections.

26

clearest indicator of these types of practices is found in the Moyne Commission report on

the economies of the West Indian colonies. According to this document, one of the

largest classes of peasant producers in the region was that which depended primarily on

wages while simultaneously renting small land parcels to grow food crops (United

Kingdom 1945:43). At the same time, the Commission noted that the "best" type of

peasant farming in the colonies involved farmers working on rented holdings of one to

five acres. The commission considered these growers to be exceptional because they

carried out both production for consumption and for sale (United Kingdom 1945:43).

This recognition by the Commission reveals two important trends that help

further clarify our picture of the West Indian non-European smallholder. First, if the

commission's observations are correct, they demonstrate the existence of small holders

engaging in multiple agricultural activities at this time. They thus suggest and support

Louis' (1981) claim that in the 19th century peasants continued to combine wage

activities with own-account production. The Commission report further shows that the

practice continued well into the next century and, as we will see, it is a feature that holds

into the present day.

The second important point is related to the first. In carrying out their multiple

was not until the 1897 West India Royal Commission Inquiry that administrators looked

more seriously to smallholder activities because the sugar industry appeared to be in

jeopardy. Calling for measures to restore sugar to its state of profitability, the

Commission suggested that the West Indian colonies might turn to peasant producers to

"support themselves" (United Kingdom 1897:17)), rather than see them as a source of

plantation labor. In the wave of land abandonment, estate abandonment, and Colonial

efforts to deal with their effects (e.g. commissioning an inquiry into the island's

economies), peasant production appeared to the Commission as the region's best option.

Yet, at this time the Commission also recommended that large estate production should

continue in tandem with peasant cultivation since :

in many places [large estates] afford the best, and, sometimes the only profitable
means of cultivating certain products...it is not impossible for the two systems, of
large estates and peasant holdings, to exist side by side in mutual advantage.
(United Kingdom 1897:17)

This statement marks the first time that there is an official recommendation for

planters to cease attracting African and East Indian labor to the estates in favor of

creating an environment by which this population could work independently. It included

implementing mechanisms to bolster the economy by expanding the possibilities for

small scale production. The Commission's plan is significant because it contradicts

In the 1940s, colonial administrators again turned to the peasant sector as the

solution to a once again wavering sugar industry. Recommendations in the 1945 Moyne

Report concurred with previous commissioned inquiries and called for the further

extension of peasant settlements throughout the West Indian colonies. What was new

about the Moyne authors' perspective, however, was their observation of smallholder

agriculture, its diversity and deficiencies, as well as its potential for benefitting the ailing

colonies:

In this great diversity of peasant holdings certain general characteristics are clear.
Husbandry is not systematic, the productivity of land is low, shifting cultivation is
often the basis, livestock are few and poorly managed, while indebtedness is
almost universal. ... In spite, however of the disadvantages and weaknesses
existing in this system, there is to be found among every type of peasant
proprietor a number who are well-fitted in every respect to profit handsomely
with encouragement. (United Kingdom 1945:44)

Subsequent reports (GOSL 1946) in St. Lucia mimicked the critiques and visions of the

Moyne inquirers, and there developed an island policy to re-arrange peasant resources

and practices so that these could contribute to the colony's economy.

The most frequently cited report is known as the 1951 Team of Experts Report.

It looked into the "possibilities of developing the agriculture" of St. Lucia (Development

and Welfare Organisation of the West Indies 1951 :i). Considered the most up-to-date

document on the state of peasant agriculture in St. Lucia, the report was used widely as

an explanation for the failings of peasant agriculture. Its recommendations informed

programs within the colony and were recognized as a model for island development.

In the report's third chapter the authors critically condemn peasant practices.

They stated that the main problems depressing the efficiency of small holder cultivation

in St. Lucia were its unproductive use of land (including the use of land for subsistence

production and for shifting cultivation, family and land tenure practices), lack of capital,

and lack of technical knowledge. However, they argued that attempting to improve the

condition of growers by providing capital to them via loans would be a mistake without

first obtaining a guarantee for increased efficiency. This warning was a significant key

to the document for it creates a space for colonial administrators to actively transform the

face of peasant agriculture and to attempt to render it more efficient according to the

team's criteria.

Indeed, the team called for the formation of growers' associations (especially

banana and cane growers associations), the formation of peasant settlements, and the

funding of various Development Authorities and Associations from which technical

knowledge and agricultural skills could be transferred to small holders. All suggestions

advocated creating or increasing the direct involvement of colonial administrators in

peasant's activities, through the transfer of knowledge and skills to peasants, and by

closely scrutinizing their activities.

There is no doubt that the policy shift related to the declining sugar industry, but

it also was connected to the banana industry and its early development. As if to

transform the island's sugar monoculture into a banana one and to continue avoiding a

diversified agricultural economy, the Team recommended that pure stand bananas be

increased on a widespread basis. It linked this recommendation specifically to small

holders:

To organise a banana export trade it is essential to have large areas of pure stand
bananas. It is from such large areas that shortfall in production by small farmers
can be made up at short notice. Thus, if a contract is made to ship 5,000 stems
and only 4,500 come forward from farmers. .it is essential to get the extra 500
stems as quickly as possible and this can be done easily from large pure stands.
(Development and Welfare Organisation of the West Indies 1951:39)

Seeking other measures that would accelerate banana production in St. Lucia, the Team

also advocated establishing a banana growers association for small holders already

exporting bananas. Further, almost 20,000 British pounds of support was directed into

the banana industry after the report suggested that colonial administrators fund banana

production ("Rise of the Banana Industry..." 1955:35). Thus, while the sugar industry

was deteriorating and large scale plantation agriculture was wavering, banana production

appeared to be growing in the backdrop, and peasant agriculture suddenly gained

countries withdrew the privileged space that non-commonwealth producers held on the

market, including those producers in the Canary Islands (Trouillot 1988).

While on the global scene sugar prices and import policies influenced the

transition into bananas, these conditions, accompanied by local developments and

circumstances in St. Lucia, helped usher bananas into the economic and social context of

this West Indian colony. As we have seen, efforts such as the Team of Experts'

recommendations also added to the creation of a framework for allowing banana

production to become a part of Caribbean economies. Beyond this institutional

framework, however, lie the local, pre-existing possibilities for bananas to become a

success in St. Lucia. These emanated from the character of the peasant sector itself.

Trouillot (1988) has argued that the key to the successful entrance of banana

production into a Windward Island economy, such as Dominica, was the congruence of

banana cultivation with what he calls a "peasant labor process". He contends that

peasants' preferred work in which the unit of production integrated with the unit of

consumption, and that income earning activities became significant inasmuch as they

could meet the needs of the domestic unit (Trouillot 1988:5). He further shows how,

based on their cultivation on slave provision grounds, Dominican peasants had a long

history of working in this manner. Bananas, as a type of provision crop, fit well with

33

peasants in this context because they matched the peasant diet. In the event that the crop

could not be sold, it still had a use value and could be consumed. For Trouillot, this is a

primary reason why banana production was accepted and adopted by Dominicans like no

other crop:

In comparison to the other possible peasant crops of Dominica, bananas offered
much higher consumption thresholds. These higher thresholds meant that the
crop could be integrated in the peasant work process as well as, vanilla or coffee,
but reach a degree of consumptive integration that none of the other crops could
enjoy. The crop fitted so well patterns of consumption that it could become a
staple in the peasant diet. (Trouillot 1988:133)

Trouillot may be correct that the connection between banana production and

smallholder consumption helped make the crop attractive and its fit with the agricultural

development of the Windward Islands tighter. However, other factors also may have

been significant, especially the importance of the economic incentive for banana

'Two sources ("Rise of the Banana Industry..." 1955, and Development and Welfare
Organization of the West Indies 1951) report conflicting data for 1937; The
Development and Welfare Organization of the West Indies reported 127,000 stems of
bananas.
Sources: Windward Islands Annual 1955:34 (figures are approximates based on chart
data) Geest Industries (B.W.I.) Ltd. 1959-60:40; Development and Welfare Organization
of the West Indies 1951; West Indies 1951-52.

The entrance of Geest into St. Lucia's banana production was timely and

expedient. The island experienced another depression in sugar production in the 1950s

from which it did not recover. With political, policy, and institutional support for banana

production growing apace following the official recognition of the sugar crisis, small

scale cane "contributors" converted their fields into bananas. Additionally, even though

bananas initially were more central to the peasant cropping system, large plantations

shifted away from cane cultivation to a concentration on banana production. The

Dennery estate, which remained under private family ownership until the late 1970s, was

the first to close down operation of its sugar factory and to make this conversion to

bananas in 1958 (United Kingdom 1990). The other two plantations in Cul-De-Sac and

Roseau were owned by Sugar Manufacturers Ltd., a public liability company. In 1954

that company took over the estates after their private owners were forced into liquidation

the preceding year (United Kingdom 1990). Yet, the estates' status as public companies

was short-lived. Five years after the take-over, Geest Industries (the shipping company)

made an attractive offer to shareholders for 50% above the shares' original value, and

acquired both estates (GOSL 1963).

In return for agreeing to the buy-out and waiving export duties for the company,

the ruling government administration in St. Lucia required that Geest maintain a majority

of the Cul-de-Sac valley in sugar cane and expand sugar cultivation in Roseau (GOSL

1963). This stipulation speaks to the developing conflict over bananas and sugar in St.

Lucia. Not many years before Geest attached itself to plantations, the island's Chief

Minister and some Cabinet members had come into power fighting for workers' rights in

the sugar industry. As trade unionists, they led estate laborers across the country in

prolonged strikes for higher wages (Charles 1994). Gaining widespread support for their

successful negotiations, trade union leaders were voted in as the colony's first local

administrators. Consequently these officials maintained a belief in the power of sugar

cane.

Jan van Geest, founder and head of Geest Industries, had a different vision.

Despite his agreement to hold a proportion of Roseau and Cul-de-Sac under sugar cane,

he saw profits in bananas. Within six years, Geest's plan to cease cane cultivation

altogether were visible to the administration:

In spite of the [Geest Industries] Company's avowed assurance to continue in
sugar, Government noted as from 1960 a determined departure from sugar cane
production to banana production on a gradual scale extending even to the Roseau
valley. Although the Managing Director of [the Company]. .. .expressed ....
his disappointment in the 1963 crop in that preliminary figures indicated a
substantial loss, however, Mr. van Geest. assured Government that the
Company would not go out of Sugar if Government so wished. (GOSL 1963:1-2)

Quoting a recent letter from Geest Industries, the administration statement went on:

As already stated in our letter of 31st May and on other occasions since
then. the Company has decided to go out of sugar because of a number of
factors that have rendered field and factory operations in cane and sugar
substantially uneconomic. GOSL 1963:2)

Indeed, by 1964, all large estates in St. Lucia had ceased cultivation of cane and cane

processing, moving into a cropping system where bananas ascended to primacy, and a

transition out of sugar cane was evident.

Bananas and Metamorphosis of the Plantation System

Banana production in St. Lucia brought not merely a transformation of the

island's predominant cropping system and a deepening of institutions surrounding the

agricultural economy of the colony, it also metamorphosed the historic plantation-peasant

system. That is to say, eventually plantations lost their footing as the predominant

production form, and cultivation of bananas based on peasant practices gained higher

rank. Plantations and peasant proprietors alike continued to work side by side,

depending on the same primary crop and selling via the Banana Association to the same

international agent. But by the 1960s, of the 10,000 registered banana growers (Biggs,

Bennett and Leach 1964:11), small scale growers contributed more bananas to the total

output than did their large grower counterparts. Figures from the next decade show that,

of the approximately 6300 growers registered in 1978, more than 5,600 (89%) of them

farmers to supply cane for these processes. But, according to Geest, bananas were

enticing cane growers out of sugar cultivation, and estate owners did not possess the

control to reverse this trend. In Geest's opinion:

we think [continuing in sugar] is possible. .. .that by using all available land
... .that we will maintain the present production... I do not know whether it will
be possible to get the cane farmers to grow more canes because the banana
industry is very attractive and I think that already some of them are growing more
bananas than cane. .if this industry will be able to survive it will mean that we
have to do everything possible from our [the estate] side. (GOSL 1960:2)

In a dialogue with the colony's chief minister who insisted on the primacy of sugar, this

issue was further underscored:

Chief Minister: If your hillside land is cultivated in cane and the cane farmers
prefer to plant banana then the company may be forced. .to take this land from
them [cane farmers] for the purpose of extending sugar. But, if you. are
cultivating bananas when sugar cane was cultivated before, it would be wrong for
us to frustrate the cane farmers by compelling them to grow more canes.

Van Geest: We could not say that a man who rents 10 acres must grow 10 acres in
cane; but we must insist. .that he must grow percentage in canes. (GOSL
1960:10, my emphasis)

Strides in the development of the banana industry thus manifested themselves in

terms of an increase in independent smallholder participation in St. Lucia's agricultural

economy. Ten to fifteen years after export banana production took off (e.g.. with the

introduction of Geest as the shipping agent) the bulk of land --and certainly most of the

flat and fertile lands- remained in the hands of large plantation owners. Yet, small scale

producers not only outnumbered large scale ones (as they did prior to banana's

international export entrance into St. Lucia), they also could finally work independently

of the estates. As Acosta and Casimir (1985:51) observe:

42

[A] consequence of the. .. .predominance of banana over the previous cash crop
consists in the destruction of traditional linkages between small-scale farming and
estate farming. The plantocracy lost its privileged economic position whereby it
used to control the only avenue open to small producers --contributors and
metayers-- on the world market.

Final erosion of the large estate system in St. Lucia occurred in the late 1970s and

early 1980s by which time the three major estates had become transformed and/or sub-

divided either into state property or small farm units. The 1970s also marked a period of

labor agitation, and political and social transition in St. Lucia. Similar to the political

and ideological ripples that carried the New Jewel Movement onto Grenada's social

terrain, tides of change washed over St. Lucia with the resurrection of the St.Lucia

Labour Party7 and the establishment of various national social groups. These groups,

begun by intellectuals and political activists in the colony, criticized St. Lucian society

on the whole. Drawing on popular notions of dependency, they also challenged the

Caribbean island's position in the international/colonial field. According to one of the

leaders (DaBreo 1981), the groups began as fora for discussing problems within St. Lucia

and accelerated into active campaign against these ills.

One way in which the campaign was waged was through trade union activity that

mobilized estate workers to protest worker conditions and terms. Over a four year period

(1973-1977) worker strikes and protests continued to challenge the estate structure,

metayage, exporting by the plantation owners), those surrounding bananas became more

CHAPTER THREE
MARKETS, TRANSNATIONALS AND THE STATE:
SECURING THE PLACE OF ST. LUCIAN BANANAS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM

If you are doing work that results in a kind of production and you cannot
independently put a price on it, then in my opinion it is senseless and a waste of
time. If also as a gardener you harvest your crop and give it to another person to
sell for you, but [you do] not know the selling price of your [product] unless you
indirectly ask another person, [and] after you have been told the price and you
do your own calculations, you realize that it is the agent who does not pay you
fairly ... that is the problem.
-a banana grower (my emphasis)

Introduction

Many contemporary authors of political economy point to the important role that

multinational corporations and nation-states play in propelling the trajectory of

globalization. At the most basic level, this is achieved when multinationals working in

countries across the globe end up linking these diverse nations (Berry 1989). By so

doing, they help make possible integrating arrangements such as North American Free

Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the European Economic Community (EEC), and thus

contribute to tightening transnational ties.

Moreover, the various ways in which multinational corporations articulate with

In the second case, other areas of the contract granted Geest greater room to

determine how, when and at what cost bananas would be produced, sold, and bought.

This included features such as the pricing system and the weekly schedule for buying,

selling and producing bananas. Both of these were laid down by Geest in a non-fixed

way. That is, the price was set according to a changing measure known as the Green

Wholesale Price (GWP), that Geest formulated, and that could be altered on the days of

banana sales. "Market conditions" were given as the reasons for such changes. The

BGAs and the small farmers who produced for them had no bargaining power in these

areas, according to the contract (Trouillot 1988).

Ambiguity in contract wording is one significant reason why this imbalance of

power could exist. For example, Trouillot (1988:146) pointed out that, while the

contract stated that the company would accept all bananas of exportable quality, the

standards for measuring quality were not defined. "In short," as Trouillot (1988:146)

says, "the...[BGA] must deliver the bananas to Geest who may accept or reject them at

will." In this way, Geest protected itself against risks; it could manipulate the volume of

bananas it would buy at any given time, by claiming that bananas were sub-standard and

rejecting them for sale. Geest's power was further exemplified by the fact that the

company is the one that provided the islands with information (inaccessible to the

average grower) on the quality demands of the UK market. It was therefore able to set

the quality standards in the Windwards and also to change those standards on a continual

basis, without being questioned.

Since 1977, there have been several amendments to the contract, many that have

loosened Geest's obligation to the Windward Islands, allowing the company to bring

bananas obtained from other sources onto the UK market. However, the Windward

Islands have remained bound to Geest as its sole buyer. During my research,

negotiations with Geest were taking place, and there also was talk of a possibility of

dismantling the exclusive buyer clause. Yet, it is significant that before the exclusivity

instrumental in linking St. Lucia to the European market --a possibility created by

stipulations of the Lome Convention. Through its contracting strategies, the company

also has captured an inordinate amount of power in Eastern Caribbean banana production

by craftily gaining control of local institutions and influencing local policy.

In addition, Geest's power to ensure the fit of Windward Island bananas into the

UK was supplemented with actions and policies on the part of the St. Lucian state over

local institutions and producers. These included policies directly mandating how and

when banana production should take place, as well as the compulsory transfer of costly

and time-intensive banana production technologies. Working under these new schemes

has restricted growers possibilities. Indirectly, people have been encouraged to stay in

banana production due to such factors as the nation's relatively undiversified economy

and its policies that discourage the development of other economic (especially other

agricultural) activities. The consequences of working under these policies (especially

those that are legally prescribed) and restrictions are addressed in the next two chapters.

Notes

1. Information concerning the 1977 contract was obtained from WINBAN memoranda
regarding contract negotiations and from the contract itself.

2. Since 1967, the Act has undergone several amendments which include changes to the
board composition. In 1979, the board was made up of 13 persons of which 7 were
appointed by the Minister of Agriculture. Thus, at this time, the government had a
majority presence on the Board and this presence was undone in 1983.

3. To my knowledge there are no instances of WINBAN officials or the police actually
coming onto farmers' fields to direct their activities. The point is, however, that the law
was established in 1986 allowing for this to be a possibility. Other laws regarding the
banana industry that seemingly lie dormant on the books have been used unexpectedly as

when the government dissolved the SLBGA board of directors in 1988 and again in
1993. This is a point made by the leaders of the current farmers' movement.

4. Because this figure only refers to those contributing to the National Insurance Scheme
it does not include all employed and employing persons in the country. Self-employed
persons are especially likely to be excluded from this figure.

Table 3.1

Market. SLBGA and Grower Prices of Bananas. 1983-1994'

Year Avg. Stg.
In EC$2

1983 4.05
1984 3.50
1985 3.48
1986 3.93

1987 4.28
1988 4.78

19894 N.A.
1990 N.A.

1991

4.76

1992 4.73

Green
Wholesale
Price3
.77
.68
.77

SLBGA
Price

43.20
41.21
47.49

.89 57.50
.88 61.81

1.06

1.08
1.14
1.17
1.08

62.47

58.00
64.00
68.04
63.58

'Price in E.C. cents per pound.
2Reflects the value of British Pound Sterling in EC$
3The Green Wholesale Price is the market-related average wholesale price (Nurse and
Sandiford 1995). The data shown in this table were taken from sources where citing the
value in British Pounds per ton. I have converted these into EC dollars per pound.
4Data for 1988 and 1989 were taken from a source not recording the British Pound to EC
dollar exchange rate. I have therefore used the rate from 1988; this will affect the
accuracy of the GWP, but not the prices paid to the SLBGA and to growers.
Source: Ministry of Finance, Statistics and Negotiating 1988:151,163; Ministry of
Finance Statistics and Negotiating 1993: 88; Windward Island Banana Association

provided technical assistance and advice for the production of non-traditional crops.

However, according to an audit report of the Ministry of Agriculture (GOSL

1990) several obstacles impeded the successful execution of these programs. Included in

these were insufficient extension staffing and funding for extension agents, insufficient

market outlets for crops, competition due to continued importation of crops selected for

diversification programs, and lack of integration of selected farmers into the goals and

purpose of the diversification program. This failure of the diversification thrust reflects a

true interest in other areas of the island's agricultural economy, namely in bananas.

The 1985 farmer vehicle program is another example of the policy pendulum that

pulls producers into banana production, and then makes it difficult for them to maintain

themselves. This program offered tax concessions and accessible bank loans to

producers on pick-up truck purchases. According to the records of the Ministry of

Agriculture, Lands, Forests and Fisheries, between 1985 and 1994, 1347 vehicles were

purchased by farmers under this arrangement. Such a move, as many warned, rendered

farmers dependent on banana production so that they could pay off the loan. It is

important also to consider that this was a time when some farmers were praised for

increasing their living standards by building new homes.

The point is not that growers should avoid raising their style of living or that they

are trying to live beyond their means. Rather, it is that their place in the banana industry

has been cemented with policies and non-policies that force them to follow certain

(expensive and time consuming) practices and that encourage improving one's lifestyle

by means that create long-term risks. In sum, growers have been positioned so that they

will continue to produce for a global market.

Third, post-harvest technology, as a primary focus of WINBAN research

activities, has developed rapidly in the banana industry and increasingly it places more

demands on growers' time. Within the industry, emphasis has been on devising methods

by which the highest quality of bananas is ensured from cutting to sale point (to Geest).

This has meant a high turn-over of post-harvest techniques, with at least one change per

five year period since the 1970s. The realities are reflected in common producer

parlance that emphasizes the recent work increase associated with cultivating bananas.

[We] didn't have so much problem [with] quality before. People come more
exploited in this industry. We didn't have to deflower. It's totally different
[now]. .. .I feel the salary is not enough for the amount of work.

More work was involved due to the technology developments, and the transfer of

more of the harvest requirements to growers. For instance, in the 1960s, producers

those with a resident banana producing farm head were given the questionnaire on the

spot, if they agreed. A total of 30 farm heads in the first two communities responded to

the questionnaire, while 30 responded in the last two. In some cases, the farm head was

not available or preferred that his partner respond to the questions. It was always males

who were not able to respond, rather than female farm heads.

Independence and Experience in Morne Verte

Morne Verte is located within the Mabouya Valley, one of St. Lucia's three major

banana producing valleys and former sites of plantation agriculture (See Figure 4.1). In

this valley lies one of the country's primary large estates, occupying over 2,500 miles of

land. As such, the Mabouya Valley possesses many of the well-known historical features

of West Indian societies including the presence of a large scale plantation surrounded by

communities of small scale producers and estate laborers. Historically, vast tracts of

CARIBBEAN
SEA

ery

Choisau

f I

Figure 4.1
Map of St. Lucia Showing Location of Mabouya Valley

Source: Map reproduced from Organization of American States (1991)

0 TI A TI/

OCEAN j

lsl-

valley lands were designated for plantation production while most of the region's

residents were attached to the estate as laborers. At a peak period as many as 1,500

persons worked on the estate (Organization of American States 1991). It was common

practice for these workers either to squat on lands peripheral to the plantation and/or to

gain permission to use uncultivated land (Organization of American States 1991),

attesting to the interdependence of plantation and valley residents.

As a community lying outside of the estate boundaries, but still within the limits

of the valley, Morne Verte is a unique case. It is concentrated in the north eastern

portion of the valley and comprises four individual settlements that I have renamed: Ti

Bois, Te Riche, Lavibel and Espwe. Given their residential location, residents of Morne

Verte traditionally have not worked on the valley's main estate. For those who were

agricultural laborers, two medium sized estates in Morne Verte provided a source of

employment for residents between (at least) 1951 to 1979-86. Run by British and East

Indian proprietors, these estates occupied much of the flat, fertile land in Ti Bois and

Espwe, totaling approximately 100 acres and 170 acres respectively of the area's

approximately 1500 total acreage (GOSL and Organization of American States 1983:1).

Much of the other agricultural lands in Morne Verte have been held in small

independently operated holdings (Organization of American States 1991).

Thus, despite the presence of medium sized estates in the area, my own research

suggests that Morne Verte has been a community where small scale, own-account

production on private lands has been a central feature of the area's agricultural economy.

This is in contradistinction to other areas of the Mabouya Valley where independent

cultivation may very well have accompanied wage work, but where squatting or using

land by permission was more prevalent (Organization of American States 1991). It is my

conjecture that, prior to 1986, laboring for the estate was common only in Ti Bois. By

contrast, I suspect that residents of the three other areas worked as independent producers

on their own family' or rented lands in neighboring locations.

In the approximately four major agricultural areas where Morne Verte residents

are likely to farm today, much of the land appears to have been passed on as family land.

According to data gathered in my questionnaire, most of the parcels in these areas are

held either as family land or by formal ownership (while rental and squatting, for

instance, are less common). Some residents over 50 years of age also remember either

their parents or themselves having worked these lands independently with legal rights to

land use (either by family rights or formal title) prior to the 1950s. It is therefore likely

that most Morne Verte dwellers traditionally have survived as producers on family land

that eventually may have been transferred by formal title.

The late 1970s marked further changes in the potential for independent

cultivation in Morne Verte. The proprietors of the two largest estates in the community

began sub-dividing and selling their holdings into parcels of no more than 50 acres but

averaging 5.5 acres. The subdivision of both estates was complete in 1986. When the

Espwe Estate was sold, buyers used the land primarily to build homes. Consequently,

what was once a large tract of agricultural land up until the late 1970s, today is a

residential settlement situated alongside a primary road.

Those who moved to Espwe in the 1970s probably came from Te Riche or

Lavibel and had acquired money to purchase land and build homes in Espwe from

working as farmers and in other wage occupations. In Ti Bois, the former estate sold in

1986 was broken up into 17 parcels, and largely has been put into smallholder

agricultural production. According to many of the area's residents, this has transformed

Ti Bois from a largely wage working community to one based on more own-account

activities in agriculture.2 Similarly, the Organization of American States (1991:40),

states that, based on its land survey, Morne Verte residents commonly operated land

under family inheritance arrangements (i.e. family land).

According to the 1990 St. Lucian population census, the total population of

Morne Verte is 1434, with a greater number of females than males (Department of

Statistics 1990). There also is a very young age structure, with almost one-half of the

population below or above working age (i.e., below 15 years or above 69 years). Most

Morne Verte residents own their own homes (86%), while fewer (53%) own the land on

which their homes are built. An overwhelming majority of these houses (66%) were

built after 1970. The average income is approximately $13,000 E.C.

The general demographic characteristics of Morne Verte residents sampled in my

survey (household members ) are presented in Tables 4.1-4.3 These show that there are

more females than males in the sample, that 64% of the total population is of working

age, and that a majority have not completed more than a primary school education.

Table 4.1

Population Distribution of Sampled Morne Verte Farm Household Residents
by Gender and Working Age12

Total Population
241

Total Male
117

Total Female Total Working Age
124 160

'Official working age in St. Lucia includes persons between 15 and 69 years of age,
although in practice employed persons are not restricted to this grouping.
2Data are missing for 13 cases all of which are infant children.
Source: Based on data compiled by Karla Slocum

Table 4.2

Age Distribution of Sampled Morne Verte Household Residents1

Number
79
31
44
33
23
13
10
7
240

Percent of Total
32.9
12.9
18.3
13.6
9.6
5.4
4.2
2.9
100.00

114 cases of the total sample of 254 household members are missing. In most of these
cases, farm head respondents to the questionnaire were not aware of the ages of all
household members.
Source: Based on data compiled by Karla Slocum

144 cases of the total sample of 254 household members are missing. In most of these
cases, farm head questionnaire respondents were not aware of the educational level of all
household members.
Source: Based on data compiled by Karla Slocum

When the population is further broken down by farm heads, the data show that

there are far more males than female growers and that the average age of all producers is

44 years (Table 4.4). Like the general population, most also only have completed

primary school (Table 4.5). In terms of farm resources, the average land size among all

or small business operators. However, that independent banana production predominates

as an income-earning (sometimes complemented with other work activities) underscores

the firm base of independent work activities in the area.

Banana Production and Autonomy of Work

If you work for someone else you wouldn't push yourself. I wouldn't do
more work for you
--a Morne Verte banana grower

In Morne Verte, notions about working autonomously, contrasted with ideas

about working for an employer, are linked to a belief that banana production, as an

independent task, is good work. This belief is almost mystifying when considered

against the flagrant critiques of the banana industry that are heard in the households and

on the streets and fields of the area. Vehemently, the community's producers complain

that the price is too low, the work increasingly harder, and the industry full of corruption

and mistrust. Almost universally, they are clear that growers are not now receiving a

benefit from the hours spent producing bananas. Yet still, for them, banana production is

good work. The benefit lies in its status as an independent occupation, and hence its

association with autonomy of work.

To illustrate the important concept of autonomy in work, producers always

contrast working for oneself with working for another, showing how one situation is

about freedom and the other about restrictions and insecurity. In independent farming,

they talk about the ability to set their own work schedules, go on the field at the hours

they prefer, work intensively to get more out of their work or be able to take time off as

they desire. Explaining the belief, many growers put it the way this grower did:

I can leave here anytime... .I don't have to wake up early. [But] if I work
for someone, the person tells me I have to work from 7:00 am to 3:00 pm.

Banana production thus is an especially valued form of independent production because

it is conceived as an occupation that permits someone to work according to his or her

own schedule.

Freedom of work not only entails self-determination of activities, but also the

ability to make money for oneself and the ability to have the profits go into one's own

pocket. Producers complain that when working for wages the profit goes to the

employer. Additionally, wage working is equated with vulnerability given the potential

for job loss according to the determination of the employer. Underlying this cultural

concept of autonomy of work, then, is an objection to unequal terms that characterize

employer and employee relations. It is an implicit critique of power relations between

worker and "employer", and a statement about the connection between freedom and

dignity.

According to Morne Verte ideologies, banana production circumvents the

complications and inequities associated with wage work. People believe that handling

one's own farm means that the work is guaranteed to continue and that (in the case of

bananas) the money also is steady. Power relations, between employer and employee,

also are considered to be non-existent since, as growers describe it, "you are your own

boss". The attraction of being your own boss means not risking job loss, not having the

profits out of your hands--in sum, not answering to an employer authority.

This perspective diverges from what Trouillot (1988) noted among banana

producers in Dominica. They related their interest in the occupation to the consumption

possibilities that banana represents in the advent of an inability to sell the crop. Such an

idea suggests that, in the Morne Verte model, it is not simply the utility of producing

bananas that is important but primarily the freedom and dignity that it affords a person.

A previous agricultural laborer who recently became a sharecropper-banana

producer implied that she took the share arrangement precisely because it was a chance

for her to work for herself and, by extension raise her family's dignity:

The reason why I am doing sharecroppingg] is because I see no progress in
it when I do it for others. Sometimes I get $40.00 but if the lady gave [the
land] to me I will get a better satisfaction when I work for myself. I am
the one going for the money and.... she [the land owner] gets half the
amount. Some people say that I give her too much money but I say, when
someone gives you something so that you can earn a living, you must not
cheat on the person... .Another reason why I took the bananas is because
I see that nobody in my family has their own farm except my uncle
... and I say every day that it is not wise to have all of us working for
people.

It may seem contradictory to refer to a sharecropping arrangement as autonomous work

as this woman does in this statement. However, her remarks signal the importance of

having access to land as a means to working for oneself. Indeed, as she describes it, she

is sharecropping because she sees "no progress in it when [she does] itfor others."

possible angles. Consequently, there is less and less possibility for working

autonomously, especially in the way that growers state they prefer to work.

Notes

1. Family land is land that is communally owned by persons who have inherited the land
from a family member who has died intestate. It may or may not be worked jointly
among co-heirs, however, all heirs across several generations have rights to cultivate or
reside on the land. Many authors (cf. Barrow 1992, Besson and Momsen 1987) contend
that family land represents an institutional form that ensures access to land in contexts of
land scarcity.

2.My understanding of the recent history of Morne Verte is based on information
obtained in my questionnaires, interviews and from my thirteen months of interaction
with residents. It is in no way conclusive and needs to be backed up with further
historical research.

3. These data, not yet published, were compiled and supplied to me by persons in the
government statistics office.

4. According to the SLBGA files, there were 469 active banana growers in Morne Verte
in 1992. However, this figure would include all growers (full and part-time) while the
national census figure only incorporates full-time growers.

5. The household census that I conducted in Espwe and Te Riche included data on the
number of households, household size, land tenure for farms, and occupation status of the
household. The numbers concerning total households in the region differ from those in
the national census, most likely due to the fact that the boundaries for these four
communities are not fixed and my choice of boundaries undoubtedly differed from those
of the census takers. Additionally, my sampling methods were different in Ti Bois and
Lavibel where I did not carry out an entire household census.

6. It is my impression that some of these positions recently have acquired a higher status,
and they must be distinguished from the prestige attached to teaching or civil servant
occupations. The tourist industry quickly is being advanced as the most important (and
certainly most hopeful) sector in the country. Additionally, working in a factory or other
wage position, at the time of my stay, meant having secure work, or something to do.
Certainly, household residents who only assist on the farm of the farm/household head
would bypass farm work to take a waged position.

104

7. However, it probably was not occurring as frequently as usual during my research,
given growers' continued inability to secure these products from the BGA.

87

The working for oneself concept is underwritten by a wider, more pervasive idea

that people should take care of themselves. This is a concept that emerges both in

popular discourse as well as in popular practice. Many farming practices are organized

in ways that allow individuals to work independently, as opposed to working together in

the sense of a family farm. For instance, parents may parcel out portions of land to their

adult children rather than having them assist on the farm, while household residents also

are not obligated to work on the farm, especially if they find other work (including farm

labor on someone else's farm) that they can do for themselves. There is thus respect of

people's abilities to secure independent work on their own, and great latitude is granted to

household residents and/or family who pursue independent options.

People who do assist a parent or family member on the farm, may move in and

out of other occupations as they come available. They may work on the farm, leave

when another opportunity for employment comes along, and then return to the farm if

that job ends or if they have time available. In this case, they may not be working in

self-employment tasks, but the fact that they are securing work for themselves, with

which they can support themselves, renders this move acceptable and preferable. It is

further accepted that people should do what they can to be able to support themselves,

including maintaining a flexible spirit in order to take advantage of work options that

become available.

This ethic is akin to what Charles Carnegie (1983) has called "strategic

flexibility" a principle that guides working strategies in the Caribbean. It entails